Fox, Turner Sports extend Major League Baseball contracts

Five weeks after extending its agreement with ESPN, Major League Baseball today announced a new eight-year agreement with the Fox Sports Media Group and Turner Broadcasting System.

One major component to this is that MLB “Extra Innings” and MLB.tv subscribers will no longer be blacked out on games in the Fox Saturday exclusive window, beginning in 2014.

Here’s the MLB news release:

Major League Baseball today announced new, historic eight-year national media rights agreements with Fox Sports Media Group and Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. that — combined with the recently announced new ESPN deal — establish the national television landscape for the sport in the U.S. through 2021.

Combined, the three deals will deliver more than a 100 percent increase in annual rights fees to Major League Baseball over the current deals. As part of the new agreements, which take effect beginning in 2014, the World Series and All-Star Game will remain on Fox, while the League Championship Series and Division Series will be shared across FSMG, TBS and MLB Network.

Both deals also include digital “TV Everywhere” rights to stream televised games and other MLB-related programming online and through mobile devices.

Under the terms of the new agreements, FSMG will retain the rights to the World Series, the All-Star Game and one League Championship Series while adding coverage of two Division Series starting in 2014. FSMG will also double its number of regular season national windows on Saturdays from 26 to 52, with 12 of those windows exclusive to Fox and as many as 40 non-exclusive windows on another nationally distributed Fox channel.

TBS will retain the rights to air one League Championship Series, two Division Series and one of the wild card games. TBS will also air afternoon games with new co-exist rights on the final 13 Sundays of the regular season.

FSMG and Turner will alternate each year which league’s DS and LCS games they telecast, with MLB Network airing two Division Series games each year from the same league as Fox.

Baseball Commissioner Allan H. (Bud) Selig said: “I have often said in recent years that we are living in the golden age of baseball and that the game has never been more popular. But to see the unprecedented and historic commitment these networks have made to televising Major League Baseball for years to come is truly amazing.

“On behalf of Major League Baseball, I am thrilled that we will continue our relationships with both Fox and Turner. Both networks are passionate about baseball and are committed to covering, promoting and growing the sport, and I want to thank them for their continued support.”

“It is with tremendous pleasure that we’re able to extend and advance our relationship with Major League Baseball for another eight years,” said Randy Freer and Eric Shanks, co-presidents, Fox Sports Media Group. “MLB, both nationally and regionally, has been part of our DNA here at Fox for a long time, and we’re looking forward to working with MLB on many new initiatives that will grow and promote the sport in coming years.”

“Major League Baseball on TBS has very much been a staple of our programming foundation for more than 35 years and the network has been the home to so many memorable baseball moments over that time,” said David Levy, president of sales, distribution and sports, Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. “When you look at the overall scope of television and digital rights that we acquired, this new agreement adds considerable value to our portfolio of sports offerings.”

Additional highlights of the new agreements include:

Games included in the Fox Saturday national exclusive windows, which were previously blacked out to MLB Extra Innings and MLB.tv viewers, will be available beginning in 2014.

In addition to two Division Series games, MLB Network has also acquired the rights to telecast both the MLB All-Star Game Selection Show and the All-Star Futures Game.

Turner will have interactive television rights, which includes the rights to create companion and ancillary products related to the TBS broadcast of regular and Postseason games.

FSMG will air a weekly 30-minute show created by Major League Baseball Productions.

Pete Dougherty

10 Responses

I remember when CBS tried doing 12 games a season, and people thought it stunk. MLB had to work to get more over the air games after that. Now it’s giveback time, with just 12 Fox games, presumably in April-June? (Then maybe TBS the rest of the season?)
Most of this is good for those with full cable or satellite, especially not blacking out Extra Innings from the Fox games !

I’m still trying to digest all of the information, but I believe the Fox and TBS games are loaded toward the end of the season. A Fox cable outlet, believed to be Fox Sports One (which will be rebranded from Speed), also will have Saturday games.

Buck and McCarver for another 8 years? We can only pray that someone at Fox will come out of their coma and replace these pretenders. With announcers like Vin Scully and John Anderson so clearly superior,Buck’s penchant for over-dramatization and McCarver’s condescending know-it-all attitude become unbearable. Bring in Vinny before he retires so he can do the World Series the way it should be done.

#7- “Buck’s penchant for over-dramatization-” I hope that is tongue and cheek. Buck could take any exciting moment in a huge spot (i.e. Endy Chavez’s catch in Game 7 of the 2006 NLCS, David Tyree’s helmet catch in the Super Bowl), and make it seem mundane!